Letter to The Editor

To The Australian 
Noel Pearson's hagiography of Paul Keating is unconvincing ('A visionary of power', 22/11). It ignores the fact that the Australian people soon recognised, within one term of government, that their country was being led in the wrong direction by Keating. They chose as replacement a much greater prime minister and re-elected him several times.

Pearson's potted account of the 'three defining moments' of our history is misleading. Australia is first and fundamentally a British nation. The facts that long ago people crossed the Torres Strait land bridge and that there has been much non-British immigration in the last half century do not affect this truth. Keating attacked the prime foundation stone of our British culture - the Australian monarchy. Australians didn't buy that and they won't buy the current 'reconciliation' campaign - really a hypocritical power grab - either.
NJ, Belgrave, Vic